Sang Qinghe

Qinghe is the name of a town, an ancient settlement in northwestern China so obscure you might not find it on a map even with a magnifying glass.

Qinghe is also the name of a Han Chinese woman. Everyone says her name was too grand, borrowing too much of the town's spirit, so her fate was destined to have a little less nobility and a lot more hardship.

She imagined ninety-nine ordinary, practical possibilities for her life.

Maybe she'd marry a Tibetan man, have two or three children, and sing across the grasslands.

Maybe she'd wrap herself in a headscarf and pray at dawn and dusk alongside her husband.

Or maybe she'd start the first nunnery in Qinghe Town, helping different ethnic cultures blend together.

There was just one possibility she hadn't counted on:

She'd meet the man of her dreams, who ate meat, had no religious beliefs, and killed living things.

Of course, given her usual bad luck,

even good things would take a lot of effort to work out.